The United States Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Pennsylvania announced that Aaron Vandaley, age 45, of Pottsville, Pennsylvania, was sentenced on March 21, 2023, to 78 months’ imprisonment by United States District Court Judge Robert D. Mariani for cyberstalking.

According to United States Attorney Gerard M. Karam, Vandaley, with the intent to harass and intimidate other persons, engaged in a course of conduct using electronic communication systems and services of interstate commerce to cause substantial emotional distress to six victims.  All six victims were former romantic partners of Vandaley or relatives and friends of his former romantic partners.

 During the course of the conduct, Vandaley repeatedly made false anonymous allegations to law enforcement agencies throughout the country.  He falsely accused the victims of committing heinous crimes including murder-for-hire, narcotics trafficking, human trafficking, and sexual offenses.  Vandaley also sent anonymous electronic messages to the victims threatening to kidnap and murder the minor child of one of the victims. Vandaley also threatened to mail parts of that minor child back to the victim.  Vandaley committed these crimes while one of the victims had a protection from abuse order against him.

Vandaley has eight previous convictions for indirect criminal contempt for failing to obey court orders of protection.  During his detention in Lackawanna County Jail pending his sentencing, Vandaley continued to attempt to contact at least one of his victims by making over 100 phone calls to the victim from jail.  As part of the sentence, Vandaley is not to have any further contact with any of the victims in the case.

The matter was investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the U.S. Army Criminal Investigation Division (CID), Fort Stewart, Georgia, and the Pottsville Police Department.  Assistant United States Attorney James Buchanan prosecuted the case.

Original source can be found here.